


awkwardness is in the eye of the beholder

by Mertiya



Category: Pacific Rim (Movies)
Genre: Confessions on TV, First Kiss, M/M, Misunderstandings, Panic Attacks, a little bit meta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-19
Updated: 2018-03-19
Packaged: 2019-04-04 10:43:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,771
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14018559
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mertiya/pseuds/Mertiya
Summary: Fielding what really shouldn't be an awkward question during a TV interview leads to a few startling revelations.





	awkwardness is in the eye of the beholder

**Author's Note:**

> Okay so Rastaban linked me to this clip: https://nerdist.com/pacific-rim-uprising-charlie-day-burn-gorman-newmann-newton-geiszler-hermann-gottlieb/
> 
> And I started faintly screaming, because Charlie Day and Burn Gorman are both just lovely people, but also the initial question got me a little bit riled up, and I started thinking about how a similar interview might look with Hermann and Newt? Hence, this fic. Also, I am extremely excited about Pacific Rim: Uprising :D
> 
> I should note that the first question was asked by the interviewer and I admit to stealing Burn Gorman's initial response, but things veer wildly off the rails from there on, for...fairly obvious reasons.

            “So I’m going to start this interview off _super_ non-awkward and ask you guys if you are aware that the internet _ships_ you two?”

            Newt blinks at the interviewer, trying to process the number of things going through his head at the same time. Among them are, ‘yes, because I exist on the internet,’ and ‘is there a reason they shouldn’t?’ and ‘why exactly would you think this would be awkward?’ Except then he realizes that Hermann actually _might_ think this is pretty awkward, and he drums his fingers against his chairs and sends a glance sliding sideways towards his coworker.

            But Hermann is just smiling, a slightly bemused smile. “Excellent taste,” he murmurs gently, and he’s probably trying to downplay it, honestly. Newt squirms in his seat, because he’s not sure what else to say, but frankly he thinks that was kind of an uncool question, when you really come down to it.

            “You know that the two of us, uh, like, we’re not hermits?” he says. Trying to avoid the edge that he’s afraid is creeping into his voice, he pushes out a laugh that he thinks sounds pretty genuine. “I mean, I’ve got a Facebook, a Twitter, like, three Tumblrs—” he just barely stops himself from mentioning the AO3 account, because mentioning the Tumblr is probably bad enough. “Like, yeah, I guess it’s a little weird in the sense that, you know, shipping real people is always a little weird, but where do you draw the line, right? Like, you get someone writing historical fiction with real people, and that has romance in it, sometimes with people who actually existed, and then, you know, it gets kind of—”

            “Newt—” Hermann interrupts him, because, oh, he’s kind of rambling, isn’t he, and that’s maybe a little weird. Shoot.

            “Yeah, sorry.” He shoots the interviewer an apologetic smile. “Anyways, yeah, we’re aware.”

            She looks a little put-off, but probably they briefed her beforehand. Heroes Newt and Hermann may be, but there’s a reason they’re usually not doing the interviews. Hermann is notoriously nervous of public speaking, and while Newt isn’t so much, he _will_ just say whatever floats to the top of his head, no matter how much time somebody from PR has spent telling him what he should and shouldn’t say.

            “So, why do you think that is?” the interviewer rallies, plastering a smile onto her face. Newt squirms again. _Probably because I’m stupidly in love with Hermann and really really unsubtle about it,_ is not something he can afford to say, not in front of the millions of people watching this, and, more importantly, not in front of Hermann himself. Their friendship survived a drift involving a bunch of monsters, he doesn’t need it to be destroyed by embarrassment in front of all these viewers.

            “Would you be asking this question of Mr. Beckett and Miss Mori?” Hermann asks quietly. “Or perhaps I should say, would you regard it as an _awkward revelation_ if you were speaking with a heterosexual pair?”

            “I, um.” The interviewer shuffles, as if she hasn’t thought about this way before, but she gives him a small, awkward smile. “I’m sorry, I was trying to dial the tension down over this question, but I think I’ve made it worse. Would you prefer we move on?”

            Oh, god, yes. Newt wants to bury his face in his hands, but he doesn’t.

            “I, er.” Beside him, Hermann is taking a long, deep breath. “I do think the question of why people might—see something romantic blossoming between us is—well, it’s rather invasive, I suppose, but such interviews usually are. It’s no worse a question than many; I merely objected to the way it was asked.”

            And that is definitely not what Newt expected, and now he’s going to have to say something. “Well, you know,” he blurts, “People are really bad at distinguishing different kinds of closeness, you know? I mean, what’s the difference between romance and friendship, right? It’s kind of just a sliding scale, and Hermann and I _are_ really close, obviously—I mean we’re drift compatible, even if we do drive each other crazy, and we just, everyone knows that we get on really well, when, when we’re not trying to bite each other’s heads off, I guess.”

            He has to concentrate on not pulling his shoulders in and trying to make himself look small; all of a sudden his ears are hot and he can hear everything that’s going on. He can hear himself breathing, for fuck’s sake, and the high buzz of the equipment, and, oh, he really can’t afford an overload right now. If that’s the term, he doesn’t really know, but “sensory overload” sure seems to capture the fact that his senses seem to be, well, overloading, whenever this happens. Maybe it’s just a panic attack. Whatever.

            “I mean, I do love Newt; that’s hardly a secret.” Wait. _What_. Rewind, rewind, rewind, replay, what?

            “What?” Newt interjects, and Hermann stares at him blankly.

            “You are aware of how I feel about you?” he says, in a slightly choked voice that’s Hermann’s Very Patient Voice that he uses whenever Newt’s being particularly annoying or obtuse.

            “Um, you like me? We’re friends. Yeah?”

            Hermann’s gaze slides uneasily back towards the interviewer, then back to Newt’s. “How could you not—we _Drifted_ , you imbecile!”

            “What, you know how I feel about _you_?” Newt says, in what’s supposed to be sort of a jovial tone of voice, only it comes out very small and terrified, because he thought he’d managed to _keep_ that secret, somehow, even if he’s not really certain how.

            “You—” Hermann pauses, swivels in his chair, blinking. “I—well, I’ve been assuming you view me as a close friend. I admit, I found it odd that I never touched those feelings during our Drift, but I assumed you’d understood my own feelings, since I didn’t think I’d be able to hide them and therefore, I—didn’t really try.”

            “What!” screeches Newt. “Dude!” Is Hermann really saying what he seems to be saying? Newt’s head’s going around and around, and the noises are getting louder, and his chest’s so tight that if he didn’t _know_ what a panic attack feels like he’d think he was having a heart attack. Everything starts to get wavery and dark around the edges of his vision. This is exactly the wrong time for this, he knows, but focusing on his breathing just isn’t doing what he needs it to. Fuck, he needs a Xanax or something.

            There’s a pressure on his hand, the concerned voice of the interviewer speaking, and, above that, Hermann’s voice sounding, an oddly calm monotone. Then there’s movement, bright and dark patterns moving in front of his eyes, someone yelling. Someone else tugs at his hand, puts a hand on his shoulder, and there’s a water bottle in front of him. “Damn it, Newt, take a drink, will you,” Hermann’s voice says, irritably, and it cuts through the miasma enough to allow him to gulp down a couple swallows of lukewarm water.

            It takes a while, but his breathing starts to even out, and, trembling, he puts his face in his hands. “Shit,” he says, as soon as his vocal cords decide to function. “Shit. Sorry. Shit.”

            “Is it really that terrifying a revelation?” Hermann bites out, and he sounds stripped of emotion, bleak, raw.

            “Yes! No! Dude, I thought—” He has to get this out, now; he can’t let Hermann keep thinking this is somehow his fault or whatever. “I thought that’s how it was, only the other way round?”

            There’s a very long pause, during which Newt’s breathing calms down enough that he’s able to peek out from between his hands and look up at Hermann. His friend has an extremely peculiar look on his face; there’s a slight flush adorning his high cheekbones and the tips of his ears. “Ah,” he says. “Hrm.”

            “I’m so sorry, Doctor Geiszler!” the interviewer puts in, sounding a little horrified. Oh. Right.

            “Uh, are we still, uh, live?” Newt asks.

            “No, no,” she replies soothingly. “We cut to another story.”

            And that’s better than the alternative, Newt supposes, but great. Now he’s made a complete idiot out of himself on national TV. “Sorry,” he mutters. “Uh.” He looks back at Hermann. “That was definitely not how I expected today to go.”

            “Nor I.” Hermann edges closer to him. “Erm. Perhaps we should do a follow-up interview?” He looks as if he’s swallowed a lemon.

            “Probably,” Newt sighs miserably. “So, in case you hadn’t figured it out yet, I kind of have a panic disorder,” he mutters in the general direction of the interviewer. “And, um, I thought it was under control, since, y’know, we dealt with the whole apocalypse, but apparently, it, uh, it wasn’t? So much?”

            “I’m sure we can reschedule as necessary,” the interviewer says. “My—my sincerest apologies about this.”

            “I, uh. Apology accepted, but I’m kind of glad this happened?” Newt says hopefully, looking over at Hermann, who gives him a surprised, shy smile.

            “I suppose it was rather serendipitous,” he allows.

            “C’mon, Hermann, I can’t believe you just _assumed_ —”

            “You did precisely the same thing, you do not have a leg to stand on—”

            They’re leaning closer and closer until Newt can feel Hermann’s breath on his lips. Well, they’re not live anymore. He leans forward quickly, just brushing their lips together. Hermann sucks in his breath in shock, then reaches forward and just lays his hand on Newt’s knee. “Perhaps we’d better reschedule, then,” he says, quietly.

            “Oh, shit.” Newt gropes for his phone. “My Twitter’s gonna blow _up_.” _And let’s not even start on what’s going to show up on my AO3._

            “Can’t you put that thing away for half a second?”

            Newt rolls his eyes, but he shoves it back into his pocket. “Only for you, babe.”’           

            “Thank you,” Hermann says primly, but he gives Newt that shy smile again, and, oh god, Newt thinks he’d probably walk through fire for that look. Well, he probably would’ve walked through fire for Hermann anyway? But moreso, now.

            “We’ll be in contact,” the interviewer says faintly, sounding a bit poleaxed. Newt’s kind of sympathetic. He’s also feeling a bit poleaxed, but also he’s starting to suspect he’s about to be on cloud nine, so that’s pretty cool.

            “We should get dinner?” he suggests.

            “It is one-thirty in the afternoon,” Hermann says severely.

            Oh. “Lunch, then?”

            Pause. Deep breath. “Yes, all right. We do have a lot to talk about.”

            “Yeah,” Newt agrees. “Yeah. We do.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this story, please consider checking out my original work at mertiya-writes.com!


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